Transforming Museums and Galleries Digitally Part 3: The Immersive Viewer Engagement in Digital Art World
In the last couple of years there has been a significant shift in the amount of time we spend with digital media; smart phones, computers, tablets, tv. Information is more interactive, engaging, immediate, and personally relevant. Articles detailing commentaries and concerns about how glued people are to their phones is more and more prevalent. What does this mean for how people engage with digital art?
“Digital art, unlike traditional mediums of art, offers a multitude of sensory possibilities that can transform the world of the viewer, and creating a new way of experiencing the world. It presents the world as indeterminate and fragmentary, breaking down the traditional boundaries between the artist and audience. This is especially evident in immersive art; a multi-sensory experience.”
Dough Aitken
Much of this is summarized in the Doug Aitken’s art. Aitken works in video installations, sculptures, photographs, publications, happenings, and architectural work, shifting the perception and location of images and narratives. He states: “What if, when you walk into a museum, there’s no sense of time or location, no path that’s well-paved for you? What if, instead, you the viewer can create your own narrative and author your own experience out of these encounters you come across?” This is summarized in the 2016 exhibition at MOCA (Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles) Doug Aitken: Electric Earth.
Electric Earth is a disorienting sensory overload that narrows the gap between viewers and the art. Moving from room to room, visitors are presented with videos, as the sound from the next room morphs with that of the current space. The digital, audio, and architectural experiences combine to create a new world for the viewer that challenges their own sense of place in the real world.
TeamLab
Other examples of immersion into art were exhibited earlier this year at the Pace Gallery in London by teamLab in their exhibition Transcending Boundaries. This exhibition included two artworks: Universe of Water Particles and Flowers Bloom on People. Universe of Water Particles is a virtual waterfall that flows along the gallery. The audience engages with a continues and virtual experience of nature.
Flowers Bloom on People is an apparition of flowers, depending on the movement of the visitor. It is like having flowers bloom and disappear at you every move and touch. It is the presence of people that brings the flowers to life, requiring the active participation of visitors.
The Viewer: An Active Participant
What digital art offers the audience is a more intimate connection between the artist and the viewers, as well as a potentially fully immersive experience. The line between art-artist-viewer is being blurred and redefined. In many ways, the viewer is no longer a passive and stationary figure; movement and participation in the artworks is what gives immersive digital art life.
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